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Eagles football turning the corner

NEW ULM — Friday night, the New Ulm Eagles football team did something that they had not done since the 2009 season.

They won two straight games as they topped Tri-City United 36-34.

“Hunter (Ranweiler) threw a great ball,” said Eagles wide receiver Connor Foley, who set a Minnesota High School record last week with six touchdown receptions. “We were running our routes fine. They were a lot more aggressive than any other team we have played this year.”

Friday, Foley caught three passes from Ranweiler for 82 yards.

But his biggest catch came from the arm of TCU quarterback Peyton Collins. Foley intercepted a pass from Collins that was tipped by teammate Sean Howk at the 2:40 mark of the fourth quarter to help seal the win for New Um.

“I did not think I was going to catch it,” Foley said. “I thought that it was going to fall straight down to the ground. It is amazing to be 2-1 now. Last season we had two wins all year. We are getting more confident each game — our linemen are picking it up and holding blocks for us.”

And this was really a team win with not only players like Ranweiler and Foley contributing. Running back Jacob Beranek had a big 18-yard touchdown run that was preceeded three plays earlier by his 14-yard run.

Taylor Savoy had an interception earlier in the fourth quarter that led to a touchdown and gave the Eagles a 34-26 lead. And the Eagles’ defense, led by Joe Fortwengler, held TCU three times in the first half on fourth-and-short situations, One of those stops came on the Eagles 5-yard line when Connor Gag stopped Collins for no gain and gave New Ulm the ball.

“The character that this team is showing on offense and defense is fun to be around.” Eagles coach Corey Kneeshaw said. “A lot of the credit goes to these kids who believe in me and the new system. A kid like Taylor Savoy who played hard tonight — his grandfather passed away this week and he laid it on the line and had that huge interception.”

Kneeshaw felt that if TCU was going to widen out their linebackers and take Foley away, Ranweiler could use his legs. Ranweiler scored three rushing touchdowns.

“And Jacob Beranek was getting some huge running lanes so we felt we were going to be able to run,” Kneeshaw said.

PERSONAL FOULS SPUR EAGLES: Kneeshaw felt that some of the late hits and personal fouls by TCU (two back-to-back in the fourth quarter) may have put a burr under the saddle of the Eagles.

“They were taking some liberties, especially with Hunter (Ranweiler) and our offensive line did not like that,” Kneeshaw said. “They told me that they wanted to run the ball. We do not play like that — we do not take liberties with other team’s players.”

Ranweiler was hit late many times in the game and was down after his facemask was twisted and turned. Another time he was hit late after releasing a pass. But Ranweiler got the final say. On a fourth-and-1 with under two minutes to go in the game on the TCU 40 -yard line, Ranweiler got the Titans to jump offsides for an Eagles first down and New Ulm was able to run out the clock.

DISAPPOINTING LOSS FOR CHARGERS: Minnesota Valley Lutheran head football coach Jim Buboltz said that Friday’s 31-8 loss to St. Clair — after MVL had an 8-0 lead — was pretty disappointing as they fell to 0-3 on the year.

“We had an 8-0 lead and right before half they took a 12-8 lead and it looked like the air went out of our guys,” he said. “It was a pretty disappointing.”

“We did throw the ball OK at times, but we did not get a consistent running game goin,” Buboltz said. “Our offensive line struggled — we need to work harder. We could not consistently move the ball. They had a 3-3 defense, they blitzed a lot. We worked on that in practice but when it was game time, it was different. From week two to week three, this was a big step back. The best running backs in the league cannot run anywhere if they do not have a consistent line. It was just a struggle (Friday).”

Buboltz felt that both Jake Kettner and Matt Stein had good games for the Chargers. “But after the half we did not seem very interested, “ said Buboltz who is still at 99 career coaching wins. “We have to make some tweaks in personnel changes and we will. Kevin (Hulke, assistant coach) and I talked about that and we will find the right combinations. I am surprised that we are 0-3 right now.”

MISTAKES HURT GREYHOUNDS: New Ulm Cathedral head football coach Denny Lux said that early mistakes hurt his team in their 2-point loss to Lac qui Parle Valley Friday.

“But I give our guys a ton of credit because we hung in there with them and did the things that we meant to do,” Lux said. “And we had the lead (35-34) late in the game, but it did not work out.”

Lux felt that the Greyhounds turnovers were due in large part to exchanges between the quarterback and the running backs.

“In this offense, our backs are at full speed when they get the handoff so there is still some technique that we are working on,” Lux said.

“I could not be happier in how these guys are running this offense because this is just the third game with it.” he said. “The deception and the speed at which we are coming out of the backfield is tremendous. The turnovers we had are pretty uncharacteristic of our team.”

Lux was happy with the running of David Berg in the game.

“He does not need much of a hole and our linemen are getting to the right guy,” Lux said. “It is not just David — it is our halfbacks going off tackle and our quarterback putting pressure on the outside. We are getting those defenses to look around a little bit.

“We did give up too many opportunities defensively so we have to get better there. They were the best team we have played so far this season.”

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